I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on Psalms 105-107.

    Psalms 105 recounts how God cared for the children of Israel and shaped them as a people. When they were few in the land of Canaan, which God had promised to them as an inheritance, He protected them from the more numerous people around them. When the sons of Jacob began to assimilate with the locals and thus lose their identity as the people of God, God ordained a famine in Canaan. But first He sent Joseph ahead of them into Egypt as a slave. Through Joseph’s faithfulness in adversity God prepared a place to forge the descendants of Jacob into the Children of Israel (these two names for the same person which reflect how his relationship with God changed over time also reflect how his descendants relationship with God changed over time). In due time, God acted, by calling Moses, to bring this new people out of Egypt and forged them into a nation as they traveled through the wilderness. All of this was done in order to create a people who would follow God’s will and model it for the world.

    Psalms 106 recounts how the Children of Israel failed to live up to the plans which God had for them. Time and again, despite the many miracles which God performed for them, they failed to trust Him and turned away to other gods. And time and again, God called them back to Himself by a combination of punishment and mercy. The psalmist does not recount these things to condemn the Jewish people. Instead he does so to remind us of God’s mercy, to remind us that when we have sinned, God will be merciful to us when we turn from our sins and back to Him. If we are currently being faithful to God, let us praise Him for the wonderful things He has done for us. If we are currently in rebellion by being sinful, let us call on God to bring us back to Him; let us repent of our sins and return to Him.

    Finally, for today, Psalms 107 calls on us to tell our story. How did God redeem you? How did He rescue you from your life of sin? Every time I read this psalm it touches me deeply. Some people were wandering and lost, without shelter and dying from hunger. When they cried out to God, He led them to a place of food and rest. The psalmist goes to to describe various ways in which people found themselves at the end of their rope and called out to God. In each and every case, God came to them and showed them the path out of their troubles. Do not be afraid to tell people YOUR story. Reading this psalm reminds me that it is time to tell my story again, not in today’s blog, but as a separate entry later this week (possibly later today).